A blog expanding on the subjects discussed in our movie "Science Sex and the Ladies." We blog critically on a specific intersection of science, sexuality, and feminism; particularly paying attention to how female sexual response is discussed, portrayed, and studied in our culture. So...if you're interested in science, sex, lady stuff, or indie movie making...this is the blog for you.

1.31.2014

"10 Surprising Facts About Orgasms" Mini Series #4

Googling around about female orgasm, I quickly found an online Woman's Day (of I-kinda-get-it-confused-with-Ladie's-Home-Journal fame) article called "10 Surprising Facts about Orgasm." Thus, the "10 Facts Series" was born so I could share my thoughts on each of these 10 list items - 1 per day for 10 days. Check HERE to see all that have been done so far. Now enjoy number 4.

4. Finding your G-spot may improve the likelihood of orgasm.Can you identify your G-spot? The "G" refers to Ernst Gräfenberg, MD, a German gynecologist who is credited with “discovering” it in the 1950s, and sex experts have long touted this area of female genitalia, which is believed to contain a large number of nerve endings, as the key to helping women achieve longer and stronger orgasm. But it’s a controversial topic. Researchers in England refuted its existence recently, even after Italian researchers supposedly found the spot on ultrasound and published their findings in The Journal of Sexual Medicine. Still, sex educators like Los Angeles–based Ava Cadell support the existence of the G-spot, and encourage women to find theirs. While the location may be slightly different in all women, it’s most often found inside the vagina and is characterized by a “rougher” texture.

No it won't. Finding your G-spot won't improve your liklihood of orgasm. Sorry, but let's stop licking the G-spot's ass, can we? It exists, I'll give it that. That little bumpy thing in your vag might even cause you to ejaculate if you rub her real hard. It might. It might not though too. It ain't gonna give you an orgasm though. It just doesn't do that. Find me any study that shows g-spot stimulation as a cause for an orgasm, and I'll swallow a goldfish whole (or something else people in this situation do - eat my shoe or something I guess).

There is physical evidence that g-spot stimulated ejaculations take place. In the 1982 book The G-spot and Other Recent Discoveries about Human Sexuality (this book named the g-spot and brought it to the public), the authors put out lovely clinical evidence that the g-spot in ladies is really just a sort of underdeveloped prostate that's wrapped around our urethra which sits above the our vagina. Rub it aggressively and it can cause ejaculation - fluid expelled out of the urethra. That's it. That's really the only thing the g-spot is known to do -an ejaculation, and an ejaculation is not an orgasm. Men ejaculate at the same time they orgasm, but these are still two different things, and the orgasm is the one that makes your pelvic muscles rhythmically convulse. The orgasm is the one that gives that feeling we collectively understand as the orgasm. The ejaculation on its own might feel interesting or pleasurable to some, but it is not an orgasm. That same book, though, also had some stupid shit in it. It made un-evidenced (except that women said they had them on surveys) assertions that the g-spot also can give a woman this other, more full-bodied vaginal/uterine orgasm. They don't ever explain what this other orgasm is physically. They never cite any clinical evidence of women having this other orgasm, and frankly the assertions are based more strongly in Freudian ideology than any real evidence. The research since then (it's been over 30 years now) hasn't given us anything more to help their bullshit assertions. Yet that's what we all think of the g-spot as, some magical awesome orgasm giver in the vag. We rarely hear it in connection to ejaculation even though that's all we really can for sure associate with it.So, in that way, I'd say all women do have a g-spot. I's just the area in the vagina where one can feel the spongy erectile tissue around the lady prostate getting all puffed up during arousal. I don't see that as controversial. The thing is that, like the word "orgasm," the word "g-spot" means whatever the hell the person saying it wants to mean. It often is used to vaguely mean a undetermined area in the vagina that is sensitive enough to cause an orgasm when stimulated. That g-spot should be controversial, cause it's a bunch of bullshit. So, this #4 should really have said "Finding your G-Spot could improve your likelihood of an ejaculation." Now that's true, but even so there's not enough research yet (since all the g-spot studies seem to focus on chasing this dumb idea of a vaginal orgasm instead of on ejaculation) to know if all woman are even capable of ejaculation. Some of our underdeveloped prostates may be a little more developed than others. What I can say pretty confidently is that some women like it rubbed. Some women think rubbing it hurts. Some women ejaculate. Some women have never. Most women have had a penis rubbing it in many different speeds and angles and lengths of time and yet most haven't ejaculated from that. So, like I said, let's please stop licking the g-spot's ass. It doesn't give us orgasms and it might, maybe give you an ejaculation, and if it does, you might like it.P.S. Men can feel their g-spot/prostate through the front wall of their anus, and if you rub it real hard, they too can ejaculate sans orgasm! P.S.S. I'm not going to go into those 2 studies, from England and Italy, that are spoken of above. Neither is very compelling to me since both ask women whether they've had vaginal orgasms and then take their word for it without physically defining a vaginal orgasm or attempting to discern between possible different meaning women may have when they say that. Neither is a definitive study by any means, and just know that a group of scientists looked through 60 years of studies involving a "g-spot" and haven't found conclusive evidence of this magical orgasm giving entity. If you want a bit more info on these and other studies THIS PAGE is a good, quick, basic overview of the major studies that have hit the webosphere in the last few years about the G-Spot. However, please notice that this information about the g-spot doesn't talk about female ejaculation at all. It's strange, but as I mentioned earlier, most things speak about the g-spot not by using the term as the female prostate that protrudes from the vaginal wall (which is based in a realistic understanding of female anatomy and clinical studies). Instead G-Spot is almost always used as the undefinable spot in the vag that can cause vaginal orgasms. So, since that's based in, well, nothing really and doesn't actually exist but is regularly spoken of as if it should exist - it's obviously a pretty controversial thing. Check tomorrow for #5